Author: grzegorz30123f14

Get Your Daily Serving of Thumb Stretch Here!

Posted on by grzegorz30123f14

In today’s smartphone market if I say “powerful high end phone” what do you think?

I bet you thought about either the new iPhone or a Samsung, HTC, or LG Android phone. These phones are indeed powerful, high end, premium, and fast and have all the latest features. What else do they have in common? Huge screen sizes. The iPhone 6 is the smallest of the bunch and still usable in one hand however on the Android side it seems that every flagship phone is over 5 inches now. This makes it very difficult for individuals with petite hands to handle these large phones.

Is there a market for the small Android smartphone? I believe so. Per our in class discussion regarding new product opportunities one of the many ways to enter the market place is by “Understanding the customer.” Companies recognize that people want smaller phones so companies make “mini” versions of their flagship phones, this is only done within the Android camp; however, these mini smartphones are underpowered so they are not a flagship any longer. There are many articles online about how there should be more small smartphones for customers that don’t sacrifice power and premium feel.

There is a new phone that was just released called the Sony Xperia Z3 Compact that I believe meets the needs of many consumers in the US market. The phone is small and does not compromise on power or premium feel. I think Sony did a great job with the phone because it fills a gap in the smartphone market. Looking at this situation using a hypothetical QFD approach Sony identified a need for a small no compromise smartphone. Sony filled that need by developing a phone with great battery life, a small form factor and high end specifications. Sony related customer wants (small form, performance) to its product how’s by pairing the phone with a powerful battery, great camera, small size and other premium specifications. Sony looked at the requirements of the phone and tried to find relationships between the firms “how’s” so that they could build a phone consumers want. Sony could pair its energy saving software with a powerful battery for better battery life or use its display (TVs) expertise to develop a low energy vibrant display for the phone. Sony had to make some compromises in order to keep the cost and size within reason so Sony had to develop some customer importance ratings such as small size, screen pixel density, battery life, camera, etc. and rate them. Sony then could evaluate competing products against the Z3 compact and see how it compares. Finally, to complete its QFD analysis Sony would compare the performance of the product to the desirable technical attributes. This would mean testing for battery life, screen quality, camera quality and performance, bendiness, etc. Once Sony determines its phone meets the specifications it desires it can then release it to the public.

Going through this QFD approach for a new ‘standard challenging’ product helped me understand the process greatly and really appreciate the effort that goes into developing a new product and building a QFD house of quality.

What you do you think about the trend in smartphone sizes?

Are you for or against the increasing size of smartphone screens? Why or why not?

 

Sources:

http://www.theverge.com/2014/10/3/6887063/sony-xperia-z3-and-z3-compact-review

http://online.wsj.com/articles/how-to-find-the-phone-that-fits-your-hand-1395795606

http://techland.time.com/2013/07/18/the-htc-one-mini-is-yet-another-compromised-small-android-phone/

http://androidandme.com/2014/10/opinions/dear-google-please-make-a-smaller-nexus-6/

https://gigaom.com/2014/10/13/best-phones-under-5-inches-2014/

So this is what Deja vu feels like…

Posted on by grzegorz30123f14

About a year ago I was working my first big job on a large web project. I had to teach myself pretty much everything along the way. My supervisor asked me many many times when (approximately) I would finish each part of the project. I never really understood what all the fuss was about regarding timelines. I never knew what to say. On the inside I always thought that I would just get it done when I got it done. I was not able to predict efficiently until the very end of activities how long they would take because everything was relatively new to me. Now in hindsight I see how helpful these planning concepts and skills would have been in planning and changing the project according to time constraints. Learning planning techniques in class such as identifying activities, mapping out precedence, estimating time and identifying critical activities/paths is very new for me but finally brings all those questions I was being asked into perspective. I knew that having time estimates was important and necessary to plan but I never realized how important and complex planning could be. I now plan to take a more proactive approach and will do my best to give time estimates when possible in future projects.

I am glad to say that as I am learning how to plan in class I am applying what I am learning in another classroom. In another class I am currently in we have to plan, design and build a web application in 10 weeks. This means that time is valuable and we need to balance it out with the other key project metric triangle components to make sure performance and cost (our personal time in this case) are within reason. In this project we have had to develop a GAANT chart and plan out some of the most meticulous details of the project weeks ahead of even starting to build it. In addition, we had to plan out how long activities would take. When the planning requirements were brought up in the class I was one of the only students in the group familiar with the basic terms due to MGT 301. I have been able to help the team and manage our time so that we do not get behind in our project. We have identified activities that can be crashed (by investing more time in the week and putting our more experienced group members on specific tasks) as well as identifying activities that could be run concurrently (done at the same time) so that we can get more done in the same amount of time by splitting our group into mini groups.

Questions:

–          Have any of you had the above issues at a new job or on a unique project?

–          Have any of you seen the lessons and concepts we are learning in class come up in a current or past class?

–          How did these concepts help you to do better or contribute in that class?

–          Have you applied these concepts to a class or work project?